Recently, a number of members of Ruddington Baptist Church visited the Veolia Mansfield Material Recovery Facility. This is where the material you put in your blue recycling bin goes for separating and baling. From Mansfield it goes to specialist reprocessors, who convert it to brand new products.
We all enjoyed the visit, which lasted about 2 hours, was hosted by a very enthusiastic and knowledgeable lady and was very interesting. We recommend it.
Below are some things we learned.
All recyclable material from Notts County Council goes here. (Notts City Council does not use this facility.)
There are five product lines: paper, card, steel, aluminium and plastic.
1 bale of recycled paper (approx. 1 tonne) saves the cutting down of 17 fully grown trees.
This Veolia facility handles approx. 85000 tonnes of material per year.
10 to 20% of the material that is put into blue bins is “contamination” ie non recyclable (eg carrier bags, plastic film, dirty nappies!!!) and should not be put in the recycle bin in the first place.
Paper and card contaminated with foodstuff cannot be recycled.
Reprocessing steel and aluminium cans is 95% faster and cheaper than manufacturing from scratch.
PLASTICS
Acceptable: any household plastic bottles including the tops. Please put the tops back on after rinsing out the bottles. Note: spray heads and pump action tops are not recyclable but the bottles are.
:butter and margarine tubs including lids – should be washed out to prevent contaminating paper with foodstuff.
: yoghurt pots
Unacceptable: film (eg clingfilm, single use wrappings), plastic fruit punnets (even if it says they are recyclable), plastic food trays, carrier bags.
PAPER
Acceptable: Newspapers, magazines, paperback books, junk mail, writing paper, envelopes.
Unacceptable: shredded paper (clogs the machines), wet wipes
CARD/CARDBOARD
Acceptable: Card packaging (such as cereal boxes), plain gift cards, card packaging, cardboard.
Unacceptable: tetra-pak cartons, gift cards with embellishments (eg ribbons,glitter and jewels), pizza trays/boxes (contaminated with food).
METAL
Acceptable: Food cans, drinks cans, aerosols.
Unacceptable: Foil, lumps of metal
Please note that the above lists concern blue bins only. There may be other outlets for some of these waste products.
Also the lists are not exhaustive. For full lists see the Rushcliffe Borough Council web-site at rushcliffe.gov.uk/environmentandwaste/recyclingandwaste/bincollections and hit “blue bin”
We should recycle as much as we can to preserve our planet and at the same time have in mind “If in doubt, leave it out,” knowing that the contents of the grey bin do not go to landfill but end up in an energy recovery plant where they are burned to make energy, which is fed back to the grid.
Written by Tony Whitton
